Lance gripped his lightsaber in both hands and stepped carefully into the cave.
The blue blade threw off a cold light, enough to cut through two or three meters of darkness ahead of him.
His steps stayed light and even, eyes fixed forward.
The passage widened the further he went.
Through the Force he could already feel the creature’s position, tucked behind a stone pillar, limbs pressed flat, muscles coiled, its breathing dropped to almost nothing.
A hunting stance.
The shadow lunged the next instant.
Roar.
The growl rolled through the narrow space as its jaws snapped straight for his throat, moving with the confidence of something that had never once failed to land a kill like this.
Fangs closed in on where his neck should have been, red eyes bright with cruelty and certainty, already savoring the fear it expected to find.
It was going to be disappointed.
Lance’s expression never shifted.
To him, the creature’s movements read almost lazy, slow enough to sidestep with barely any effort.
Hum.
His wrist turned.
The blade swept up in a clean arc through the creature’s neck, no more resistance than cutting through a soft fruit.
He followed through without pausing, a second stroke tearing down through its side, opening a wound that ran nearly the length of its body.
Smooth.
Efficient.
No wasted motion.
Awoo.
The nexu’s cry came out high and broken, disbelief still burning in its eyes even as its strength drained out mid-leap.
It hit the ground hard, twitched a few times, and went still, its breathing fading to almost nothing.
A few seconds later, silence.
Those four crimson eyes dimmed slowly, still carrying something like refusal to accept what had happened.
A faint scent of scorched flesh hung in the air.
Lance stood over it, watching the threat bleed out of the space around him, the danger he’d sensed through the Force already gone.
He didn’t leave right away.
He pushed further into the cave instead, another dozen steps bringing him to the back of the chamber, wider here than the mouth suggested, the whole space shaped like the inside of a gourd.
He held the lightsaber up and studied the rock walls in its light, running a hand near a crack where a thin current of air kept slipping through.
“Good instincts, picking this spot.”
Satisfied there was nothing else lurking, he turned back.
On the way past the nexu’s body he grabbed it by the tail and dragged it out toward the entrance, the Force making a carcass well over a thousand pounds feel like nothing in his grip.
He tossed it aside outside the cave mouth, then walked over to the boulder where Grogu and R4 were waiting.
“Come on.
We’re heading in.”
He scooped Grogu up and turned back toward the cave, R4 rolling along behind him.
As it passed the dead nexu, it slowed just long enough to get a good look, let out a burst of startled beeping, and hurried to close the gap again.
A few minutes later, a small fire crackled in the depths of the cave, throwing shifting light across the stone walls.
R4 stood watch nearby, one photoreceptor locked on the entrance, cycling red and blue.
Somewhere in its memory banks, it kept replaying the scan data.
Five meters long.
A thousand pounds.
Claws that could have opened its casing like foil.
Jaws that could’ve taken its head clean off.
And Lance had walked out without a scratch on him, just a bit of dirt along the hem of his robe.
R4’s eyes flickered once, something unreadable in the motion.
“Keep watch at the entrance, R4.”
Lance walked in with a cleaned hind leg of the nexu, skewered it on a stick as thick as his thumb, and set it over the fire to roast slowly.
Beep boop.
R4 pivoted on its wheels and rolled toward the mouth of the cave.
“Patu!”
Grogu turned and reached both arms toward him.
Lance had more or less learned this particular signal by now: it meant a hug was requested, and refusing wasn’t really on the table.
He sat down cross-legged and settled Grogu onto his lap.
Grogu’s eyes narrowed in satisfaction, attention already drifting back to the meat sizzling over the flame.
“Hungry?
It’s not ready yet.
Here, biscuits’ll hold you over.”
He glanced toward the pack sitting off to the side, and it lifted on its own, drifting through the air on a thread of the Force until it settled in front of him.
The Force really does make everything easier.
He pulled out a bag of blue biscuits, Grogu’s favorite, and before he’d even finished tearing it open, a small hand was already reaching for it.
“Here.
Slow down, that’s the last of them.”
Grogu focused entirely on the biscuits, satisfied with every bite.
His ears twitched at the mention of it being the last pack, but that didn’t slow him down in the slightest.
Lance shook his head, a helpless kind of fondness spreading across his face.
Grogu didn’t eat much.
He finished the biscuits fast, took a few bites of the roasted meat, and started yawning shortly after.
Within minutes he was asleep in Lance’s arms.
Lance ate his fill, and exhaustion settled over him almost immediately after.
Three nights now since Coruscant, and he hadn’t gotten a real night’s sleep in any of them.
Meditation helped, but it wasn’t a full substitute for rest.
He looked toward the entrance, where R4 kept its post.
Still, he couldn’t afford to relax completely. Enjoying the story? Read on at g.com.
R4 could scare off small scavengers at best.
Against anything with real teeth, it wouldn’t hold for long.
And Grogu, currently asleep with a thumb in his mouth, wasn’t exactly backup either.
Being adorable wasn’t going to talk a hungry predator out of anything.
So he’d keep watch himself tonight.
The fire had started to die down.
He lifted a few logs with the Force and fed them into the flame, the quiet crackle the only sound in the cave.
He settled his mind, let his eyes close, and smoothed the noise out of his thoughts.
His breathing slowed and deepened.
Points of light rose into view again, the same as before.
The Force.
Woven through everything, living creatures, stars, soil, holding the whole universe together in one continuous thread.
It carried no inherent leaning toward good or evil.
Light side, dark side, both were shaped entirely by the intent, the desire, the method behind whoever wielded it.
The Jedi path leaned toward stillness, restraint, selflessness, patience, acceptance, letting go of what one couldn’t hold onto.
It asked practitioners to set aside fear, anger, hatred, envy, greed, and to draw on discipline, faith, and a genuine will to protect as the engine behind the Force.
The calmer the mind, the stronger that connection ran.
Right now his mind sat like still water, undisturbed.
A quiet stillness radiated outward from him, and the points of light responded to it, drawing in from every direction, circling slowly around him.
Some drifted straight into his body, threading between cells, quietly reinforcing bone and muscle.
He didn’t pull at them.
He simply let a thread of intention guide what came naturally.
His awareness stretched further out, water dripping somewhere overhead, insects humming in the distance, wind moving through the trees outside.
Every sound resolved clearly, one from another.
Deeper still, he could feel the forest itself breathing, the slow pulse of life spread across it.
Then, without warning, several points of light struck his awareness like they’d crossed some distance that shouldn’t have been crossable at all.
A shadow, faint but unmistakable, closing in somewhere beyond his reach.
He pushed to look closer and found nothing solid to hold onto.
His brow drew tight.
The Empire’s probably picked up my trail from Kessel.
Something cold settled over him at the thought.
Escaping the Temple had never been the end of this.
If anything, it was only the beginning.
As long as Sidious held power, the hunt wasn’t going to stop.
A flare of hostility rose in his chest.
An instant later, something in his mind rang out in warning.
He pulled his focus back and clamped down on it fast.
Ever since that close call aboard the fighter, he’d stayed careful about watching his own state.